How to Build a Car: The Autobiography of the World’s Greatest Formula 1 Designer

‘Adrian has a unique gift for understanding drivers and racing cars. He’s ultra competitive but never forgets to have fun. An immensely likeable man.’ Damon Hill

The world’s foremost designer in Formula One, Adrian Newey OBE is arguably one of Britain’s greatest engineers and that is his fascinating, powerful memoir.

How to Build a Car explores the story of Adrian’s unrivalled 35-year career in Formula One through the prism of the cars he has designed, the drivers he has worked alongside and the races in which he’s been involved.

A true engineering genius, even in adolescence Adrian’s thoughts naturally emerged in shape and form – he started sketching his own car designs on the age of 12 and took a welding course in his school summer holidays. From his early career in IndyCar racing and on to his unparalleled success in Formula One, we learn in comprehensive, engaging and highly entertaining detail how a car in fact works. Adrian has designed for the likes of Mario Andretti, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost, Damon Hill, David Coulthard, Mika Hakkinen, Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel, all the time with a shark-like purity of purpose: to make the car go faster. And whilst his career has been marked by fantastic triumphs, there have also been deep tragedies; most notably Ayrton Senna’s death right through his time at Williams in 1994.

Beautifully illustrated with never-before-seen drawings, How to Build a Car encapsulates, through Adrian’s remarkable life story, precisely what makes Formula One so thrilling – its potential for the total synchronicity of man and machine, the very best combination of style, efficiency and speed.